Hurricane Ike ravaged the Galveston County area one year ago today and, all across the country, citizens are remembering the day — mourning losses, celebrating success and survival and generally assessing where we’ve come in 12 months.
Ike was the worst natural disaster to strike the county since the 1900 Storm. It caused billions of dollars of destruction, killed scores of human beings and brought change, sometimes small and often quite large, to virtually everyone who lives from Houston south to the Gulf of Mexico.
On the Galveston County mainland, life essentially has returned to normal except in a few isolated areas.
Galveston Island is a different story. While tourists may notice little change in the city, many businesses have not reopened. And a number of mostly middle-class neighborhoods remain mostly vacant.
Many Galveston homeowners — probably close to one-fifth of the pre-Ike population — have not returned. Some won’t ever come back, and many are still fighting with lenders and insurers and contractors to rebuild homes here.
The schools have reopened, for the most part, but enrollment, which was declining before Ike, has declined sharply.
Health care on Galveston Island, crippled by damage at the University of Texas Medical Branch, is recovering, but it is not back to normal.
So, one year after Ike, our recovery is a mixed bag. What follows are our own reflections on the progress Galveston Island and Galveston County have made in several areas that — more than most others — will impact how we all live in a decade.
Galveston’s City Government
We give Galveston’s city government a grade of no better than C-minus in the way the city council and mayor have responded to challenges since the storm.
Some things worked well. For example, the city’s police, firemen and emergency workers responded courageously and well in the most trying of circumstances. The city succeeded in clearing streets of debris in record time.
And, after a rough start, the city of Galveston’s planning department got its act together and expedited the building permit process without foregoing the necessity to plan better and enforce modern building codes.
The city of Galveston’s port operation, overcoming enormous difficulties, was back in business within days of Hurricane Ike.
So, bravo for a job well done in those areas.
However, the city’s elected leaders have failed to grapple effectively with what we believe are the big-picture items. Instead, they have squabbled over side issues and done little of substance. As yet, the city has not articulated or implemented a cohesive vision for the future. And, because of that, it has patently failed to provide leadership in key areas.
A glaring example is the city’s failure to provide leadership to the Galveston Housing Authority as it shapes redevelopment policy in that key area.
Another is that the city has with little resistance accepted higher fees and higher taxes as the norm for Galveston’s residents and businesses. Meanwhile, those leaders have failed to address the prime cause of those higher taxes — costly and uncontrollable collective bargaining agreements with the city’s public safety unions.
There is much Galveston’s city government could to do make recovery easier for the city’s businesses. Instead, it would rather ensure that the city’s policemen get a 6 percent pay increase and keep their lucrative pension plan in place and growing. This is special interest politics at its worst, and all the people of Galveston will pay the cost of that mistake.
Galveston’s Businesses
Galveston’s businesses get an A for effort and, in many cases, for real success in recovery.
Sadly, the list of businesses that will not reopen after Hurricane Ike is a long one. Most of the failures, frankly, were threatened before the storm, operating on thin margins with inadequate insurance and storm contingency plans. We’ll miss them.
But the list of new businesses and recovering businesses is even longer. Many are coming back as improved, trimmed-down, focused firms.
What those businesses need most is a business-friendly environment in which to operate. Sadly, that does not seem to be a focus of city government in Galveston.
University of Texas Medical Branch
UTMB is very slowly — too slowly — getting back to the new normal. But, for years to come, it will be a shadow of what it was, and the University of Texas System has done little to reassure us that it ever will be what it was.
Let’s be clear; the people of Galveston and their elected leaders in the Texas Legislature scored a major A-plus victory in securing adequate funds to rebuild the university. In particular, state Rep. Craig Eiland and an ad hoc citizens PAC worked long, hard and effectively for those funds.
What remains unclear is whether the University of Texas itself will follow through and redevelop UTMB fully. It’s no secret that UT seemed intent on scaling the institution back before the storm. The irony of Ike is that it knocked UTMB out of business for months, and thus demonstrated to the whole region how vital the medical center is to health care regionally.
Hospitals as far away as San Antonio felt the ripple effect and screamed in pain.
UT’s regents should immediately approve funding for planning and architecture of the new Jennie Sealy Hospital Tower as a token of the board’s commitment to the future of UTMB. It’s hard to understand why they still are hesitant to do that.
Galveston County Government
The Galveston County commissioners’ court has performed well throughout the crisis. We especially commend County Judge Jim Yarbrough and his colleagues for stepping up to fund indigent care with a modest tax increase.
More local funding was required by the Texas Legislature to trigger release of $150 million for UTMB redevelopment. Commissioners did the courageous thing in approving the tax.
Our County’s People
The real heroes of Hurricane Ike are the men and women of Galveston County, most of whom worked in anonymity and without pay or praise. They cleaned up their homes. They helped their neighbors. The rebuilt their businesses and patched the roofs on their churches.
Even today, 12 months after Ike, people are working with one another in ways that would have seemed unusual before the storm. If you take the time this weekend to attend any of the many community events planned to commemorate the storm, you will see that.
We’ve never been prouder of the people of Galveston County, and we’ve never been prouder to call this place our home.
